Touch A Prince Riding with Llama Drama

Touch A Prince is proving to be a very reasonable gelding.  His second ride here at Bit of Honey Training was just as quiet as the first. We were in the big arena again, and at the start while he was on the lungeline the next door neighbor let all her llamas out of their paddocks to play in the pasture.  I call these moments "llama drama" because the llamas are usually so very excited to go out to play that they run, roll, romp, and generally make a ruckus.  Llamas have kind of a swinging lateral gait to them, and they make some funny noises when they are playing.  The first time a horse sees them he doesn't know what to make of it!

Touch A Prince was very interested in the llamas, he stopped moving and froze, staring hard at them.  His nostrils got large, his ears were directed right at the llamas, and I could almost see his heart pounding through his skin.





Depending on the personality, I sometimes let a horse stare and think about the llamas, or sometimes I distract the horse and keep his focus on me.  Generally the more skittish or anxious a horse is the more I have to create stability and perceived safety for him by keeping his attention.  A more confident horse often prefers to study the situation until he has figured it out.  I've even had "thinker" type horses get mad at me if I tried to distract them.  The ones who want to understand it really don't want me messing around with their focus when they are assessing a potential horse monster.  They feel like they should be able to get a handle on the situation without me interfering.

Touch A Prince falls into this second category.  I knew he was confident in himself because of the liberty work I did with him, he didn't feel like he needed to stay near me, he wanted to go explore the arena on his own.  So when the llama drama presented itself I gave him a chance to observe.  He stood quietly for a few minutes, tensely watching and waiting.  After the llamas settled down he turned his attention back to me, and calmly resumed walking around on the lunge line.  He very clearly said that he had decided they were not an immediate threat, and we could get back down to business.

Once he had the llama drama taken care of, he was very serious about his riding.  We went both directions at the walk, trot, and canter, and he got his leads very easily this time.  He is still wearing a padded leather hackamore until he had his dental, and I ride him with a very loose rein.  He is balanced left to right, and has no trouble determining what my weight shifts mean for steering.  I trotted him in serpentines, and over ground poles.  We even added in a cross rail which he merely stepped over.  He is very mellow, or a little lazy, however you want to look at it.  I'm sure there's a good gas pedal in there if I ask for it, he is very responsive to voice commands for going faster.  But if left to his own devices he much prefers to loaf around in a relaxed posture.

Here is some video of him working in the outdoor arena, including going over the bridge and ground poles.  This is the first time I've asked him to back while I'm riding.  He has no problem with me picking up my jacket from off the jump standard and riding with it, despite its flappy nature, and he stands quietly for me to open and close the gate if we ride out of the arena.  So far I'm really enjoying this business-like fellow!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yzoC1IUjkak